Has anyone used stainless steel as a crucible?

[glasscove]

I am wondering if a stainless steel pipe with bottom welded on, would work as a crucible for melting glass. I knew SS has a much higher melting temp than soft glass, and one wouldn't have to worry about it cracking like other crucibles due to thermal shock. Anyone tried it?

[Tdub]

No, SS won't work as a crucible. I work in a hot shop and if the steel pipes get too hot, they start flaking pieces of metal into the glass. I believe this same thing would happen when heating glass in steel tubing like I think your talking about. Getting it hot enough to melt the glass would be about the same heat blacksmiths use to form metal.

[somewhere]

http://youtu.be/Q0E38msLFE0

[istandalone24/7]

somewhere beat me to it...i was going to post that link!

i think though...for the soft glass mib maker (small scale hobbyist) those little contraptions might be good for dipping mibs in clear for encasement.

[Greymatter Glass]

for melting I can see it working ok...you'd probably need to pre-fire it once to burn off any surface crud that would result in scale, but after that it should be ok... the outside of the little pot might continue to scale, but as long as the flame isnt hitting the inner surface stainless should be pretty stable.

for batching, the chemicals involved would likely cause problems for steel (they cause problems for ceramic crucibles as well...)

You can also use quartz cups for melting in.

Not sure about bor temps for all of the above.